Press releases

Labor's ongoing accusation that there is a 20% error rate in the Centrelink debt recovery system is false.
Every letter that is initially sent is based on a discrepancy between an individual's income data held at the Australian Taxation Office with their self-reported income data at Centrelink. The first letter simply notes the discrepancy and gives an opportunity for the individual to explain it. This is not a debt letter.

Minister Alan Tudge refusing to suspend or scrap the automated debt recovery system demonstrates a huge failing to comprehend the struggles and distress that the program has caused to people accessing the social safety net, Australian Greens Senator Rachel Siewert said today.

Alan Tudge, Minister for Human Services, either isn’t across his portfolio or is deliberately misleading the public a leaked Centrelink robo-debt memo shows.
In a number of media interviews since he returned from holidays just this week Mr Tudge insisted that the thousands of people slugged with false robo-debt notices were able to request assistance from Centrelink staff in person or by phone.

The ACT Council of Social Service (ACTCOSS) supports ACOSS’s call for immediate suspension of the Centrelink debt recovery program (link is external), until such a time that all issues can be rectified and convene a roundtable to work through how to redesign the system, citing significant risks that the program is harming Canberra residents who have at some time in the past accessed income support entitlements.

The National Social Security Rights Network (NSSRN, formerly National Welfare Rights Network) and its member services are struggling to respond to the number of calls from people distressed about Centrelink’s new online compliance system and being informed they have debts they think are wrong.

The Minister for Human Services, Alan Tudge, still isn’t across the detail of his bungled robo debt recovery program, contradicting his senior minister and his own department.
Linda Burney, Shadow Minister for Human Services, raised concerns following a number of confused and inconsistent statements made by Mr Tudge since he returned from holidays just this week.

ACOSS calls on the Australian Government to immediately suspend the automated Centrelink debt recovery program that is treating current and past Centrelink recipients like second-class citizens. ACOSS also calls for the program to be independently reviewed.

The St Vincent de Paul Society has called on the government to ensure that Centrelink is kept in public hands and properly resourced to support people rather than punish them, after a debt recovery scheme aimed at returning nearly $4 billion to the budget left thousands of clients with miscalculated bills.

I write with regard to the local impact if the deeply flawed Centrelink data matching and debt recovery program.
Over the past few weeks my office has been inundated with calls from my constituents over matters related to this problem.
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Many members of the community will gain some comfort from the news that the Commonwealth Ombudsman will indeed investigate Centrelink’s controversial debt recovery system. I, and I understand my colleague Senator Nick Xenophon, had been pressing the Ombudsman for such an inquiry so this is a victory for common sense and appropriate oversight of government policy.

In 2017 we will be finalising an ongoing assessment of the privacy aspects of DHS’s Enhanced Welfare Payment Integrity — non-employment income data-matching program, as well as conducting further assessments into their data-matching activities. The results of these assessments will be made available to the public at their conclusion.

No investigation has been opened in relation to this matter by my office.

The automated Centrelink Debt Recovery system has left thousands of Australian welfare recipients in crisis after a large number of inaccurate debt demands were distributed. A significant number of these vulnerable, low- income Australians that have been targeted are students.

Today I have joined with victims from my electorate of Grayndler to speak out about of the Turnbull Government’s Centrelink debt debacle.
Over the Christmas and New Year period I have been inundated with calls from constituents distressed because they have been issued debt notices and threats of debt recovery action for debts that they never incurred.
Thousands of people with disability, students, pensioners and people recovering from life threatening illnesses are being told by the Turnbull Government that the onus is on them to prove that they have not acted fraudulently.

Disabled People’s Organisations Australia (DPO Australia) calls for the Centrelink debt recovery process to be immediately halted, amid concern about the impact on people with disability.
“We are concerned that the current debt recovery process, that uses automated data matching, is particularly unfair for people with disability,” says Matthew Bowden, Co-CEO, People with Disability Australia, and spokesperson for DPO Australia.

The current attacks upon past and present pension payment recipients by Centrelink and the Minister for Social Services are “wrong at so many legal levels that it’s hard to know where to begin,”, ALHR President Benedict Coyne said.

The Independent Member for Denison, Andrew Wilkie, again called on the Government to put a halt to Centrelink’s flawed debt recovery process.
“I’ve now received over a hundred complaints from all around the country from people who have recounted deeply disturbing stories about Centrelink’s new debt recovery process,” Mr Wilkie said. “The Government has terrified countless people, ruined the Christmases of many and even driven some people to contemplate taking their own lives.